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The Seventh Dalai Lama (Kelzang Gyatso)

The Seventh Dalai Lama (Kelzang Gyatso)

1708 CE1757 CE · Modern · Lithang (Litang)

1708–1757 CE

Kelzang Gyatso (1708–1757 CE), the seventh Dalai Lama, was born at Lithang in eastern Tibet (Kham), in what is now Sichuan, and was enthroned in Lhasa in 1720. He lived through a period of intense upheaval as the Manchu Qing dynasty steadily formalized its authority over Tibet, and—raised and educated in part in exile—he was for much of his life kept from political power, which he assumed substantially only in his final decade. He is best remembered as a learned and prolific author of commentaries, liturgies, and religious poetry. His life and dates are well documented.

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Lithang (Litang)

What they did here

DOCUMENTED ORIGIN: born at Lithang in eastern Tibet (Kham), in present-day Garzê prefecture of Sichuan, and recognized as the true reincarnation amid the dispute over a rival candidate.

About Lithang (Litang)

Lithang (Litang), in the Kham region of eastern Tibet (now in the Garzê prefecture of Sichuan, China), is home to a major Gelug monastery. It was the birthplace, in 1708, of the Seventh Dalai Lama, Kelzang Gyatso; the line of the Tenth Dalai Lama is also connected with the region.

See other sages who lived in Lithang (Litang)

The world in their lifetime

Thinkers and teachers of other traditions whose lives overlapped with The Seventh Dalai Lama (Kelzang Gyatso)’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.

Works

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